THE 154TH OPEN

July 18, 2026

Russell Henley

Mixed Zone

RUSSELL HENLEY: I feel like when the weather is like this I put extra pressure on myself to make birdies, so it just feels like I'm fighting from way behind as it is. So it's just -- I feel good about it. I feel like my game is there. I've just been slightly off this week, whether it's missing the fairway by a yard or two or not holing a putt I needed to.

Happy with the finish. Still a little frustrated with how the week is going, though.

Q. How difficult is it to keep that out of your mind when you're getting frustrated? How do you deal with that?

RUSSELL HENLEY: I mean, I don't know. I think sometimes I deal with it well, and sometimes I don't. I think any person is just going to go through and struggle with it when you have any sort of expectation for your job. I just try to battle, try to fight.

Q. How much confidence and momentum does this give you going into the final round?

RUSSELL HENLEY: Yeah, I guess so. We'll see how the day pans out. I feel like there's a lot of birdies to be made out there with the wind down, so I could be back in 60-something place by the end of the day. But yeah, I feel like I played well.

Q. Everybody was talking about yesterday Bryson's penalty. I wondered if you'd seen it and whether you thought it was harsh or not harsh.

RUSSELL HENLEY: Yeah, I saw the video of it. Not being there being able to see it, I don't really have a strong opinion. Clearly they're talking about he improved his backswing. I don't know what it looked like before he came back over there or if the bush came back up after he stepped on it. But yeah, that's a tough one for him.

Q. Is it one of those things that -- I'm sure you may have been in some of those situations with penalties. Is it one of those where you have to just take it on the chin and accept it and move on or is it sometimes easy to take it not so well?

RUSSELL HENLEY: Well, I think it's tough. Every shot is so important. It's tough in the moment to take it no matter. But I would rather know that I did something wrong and be penalized for it than -- I'd like to know. It's unfortunate, but I think everybody should be held accountable for the same rules.

The issue with that to me is the fact that he's on TV every shot. If I played that hole yesterday, you might not have seen -- and I did the same thing, maybe they don't penalize me because maybe they don't see me do it. That's the tough part; he's on TV every single shot.

Q. Is that something where these things can just happen elsewhere and not be spotted, and he is spotted because he's on TV?

RUSSELL HENLEY: Absolutely. Jon Rahm at the Memorial a couple years ago on a chip on 16 where he chipped in, I think when he took the club back, the ball moved and he didn't know it, but then they slowed it down and they penalized him for it. I remember that. I think he still won.

But I had to call a penalty on myself last year at the Travelers. The ball moved in the rough. There's so many ways to get penalty strokes out here.

Q. It's a little bit like trial by television, isn't it. If you're on TV, you get seen.

RUSSELL HENLEY: Yeah, Shane Lowry had that happen last year. It's tough. Yeah, you would think just a lot of times where the ball moves in the rough, nobody sees it. You would think.